


You're from a different planet... or something

by Demonlucy



Category: Invader Zim
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Multi, Zim seems to be a decent invader here, good human disguise, will tag as I go
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-11-09
Updated: 2017-02-05
Packaged: 2018-08-30 00:45:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8512186
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Demonlucy/pseuds/Demonlucy
Summary: based on a tumblr AU postZim has a good disguise and fits in well with the humans, he befriends Dib and lives a double life. Taking over this planet should be easy! Right?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Based and inspired by this post:  
> http://demonlucy-chan.tumblr.com/post/113690394535/alapharbeytar-au-where-zim-actually-has-a-good#notes

A small spaceship travels through the galaxy, piloted by none other than ZIM! 

The mighty Tallest have given Zim a secret mission to infiltrate and take over the faraway planet called ‘Earth’. He believes that it truly is a mission worthy of his greatness, he was in Operation Impending Doom 1 after all. 

The small Irken was currently on his way to the planet, their only companion was GIR, a robot that the Tallest had given to him to help with the mission. Zim had his…. Umm… doubts about GIR at first but the Tallest had ensured him that the robot was advanced so who was he to question them.

“Doom doom doom~ Doom doom doomy doom doom~!” The robot sang happily, the song had started up a month ago after Zim had mistakenly mentioned ‘raining doom down upon our doomed enemy’s’ and showed no signs of stopping. The constant drone of ‘The Doom Song’ had now become part of the ever-present background noises along with the hum of the ships engine and the occasional beeps of its systems. 

Zim sighed and started tapping away at the computer, rather than just sitting there listening to the song and slowly letting it drive him insane her decide to send out a probe to the planet and use it to gather information on its inhabitants in order to help the duo blend in. It was never too early to start preparations for a mission.

 

It only took two months for the probe to reach its destination and begin relaying the information to the ships computer. GIR was still singing the doom song and it had started to give the Irken soldier a headache, he had more than once considered throwing the robot out of the airlock or at the very least strapping it to the roof of the ship to muffle the annoying sound. 

The ships computer beeped as it received a signal from the probe, Zim glanced down at the computer and smirked as data began filling the screen.

“Doom doo-oohh~! What’s that?!” GIR shouted, pointing at some of the photos that accompanied the wall of Irken text. 

“It’s information GIR, it seems that my probe has successfully found our target. QUICKLY! We must learn all we can about these creatures and their planet so that we can fit in and bring DOOM UPON THEM!” He shouted, shaking his first in the air for dramatic effect. 

“Yes my master!” GIR saluted, eye lights glowing red before reverting back to light blue when he laughed “Oh yeeeaaah, I was singing the doom song~!”

Dark pink eyes widened in horror “GIR no! I beg o-”

“Doom doom doom~ doomy doom doom doom doom~!” 

With a groan of defeat, Zim ran a hand down his face. A lest this time he had something to keep him occupied while GIR sang, the people of Earth won’t even know what hit them, he thought with a smirk before laughing manically.

 

Three months later

 

“Doom doom doom doom~! Doomy doomy doom~! Doomy doom~!” 

“GIR would you please stop singing, I’m trying to concentrate here.” Zim growl, only growing more annoyed when the robot continued as if he hadn’t spoken. It was the last straw, he had put up with the constant song, if saying a single word over and over could even constitute as a song, for the past six months! Half of which he spent trying to memorise information from Earth.

Zim crouched ready to pounce and attack the singing robot when the ship gave a few notifying rings before saying “Proximity Warning. Planet Ahead.” 

He glanced down at the computer curiously and found that they had reached their destination, with a grin he looked out of the window and saw the green and blue planet that they were closing in on. “GIR, we’re here! We’re finally here!” he called, turning to the still singing robot. 

GIR held a finger out to him, indicating that he waits as he sang a few more lines “Doom doom doom~ doom doom the end! Ooooh wats that?” GIR asked childishly. “Planet Earth. The first thing we need to do is set up a base. Focus and use your information gathering skills to gather more information on what is considered normal for these ‘humans’ while I find a place to set up.” 

With a quick “Yes my master!” GIR rushed to stare out of the window of the ship, watching the streets as Zim looked for an ideal spot to build their base.

After spotting an empty space between two human houses Zim shouted “HERE! WE BUILD HERE!” he landed the ship and ran out to check if anyone had noticed their arrival and come to attack them. A quick glance around the empty streets proved that no, they hadn’t. The Irken let out a small sigh of relief, happy that they weren’t about to be ambushed. He called out to his partner “GIR get out here!”

GIR nodded excitedly and tried to jump out of the ship, only succeeding in tripping and landing face first on the floor. After asking the robot what he had learned on the drive over and him replying with ‘seeing a squirrel’ Zim just decide to pick the disguises himself without GIR's help, while thinking that perhaps the Tallest had given him to me as more of an attack and defence robot.

With watchful eyes Zim flicked through a couple of disguise options for himself, none of them really jumping out at him as something he would like to be stuck with for a while, before he stopped at one that caused him to mutter "this one looks good.". With a click of the screen the ship changed shape and moved to disguise him in the chosen outfit. After a few screams of pain, caused by its prodding and the insertion of scratchy colour lenses into your eyes, the ship let out a hiss and the new 'human' stepped out.

Zim now had shaggy black hair with green tips and light blue eyes. He was wearing black skinny jeans paired with black boots, a top, some black gloves and a pink hooded jacket that resembled his original Irken clothing, the Irken Pak that is permanently grafted to his spine now resembled a human backpack. Looking down at himself he chuckled, once again amazed at his own genius!

“Master, where’d you go? Where are you?” GIR asked worried, looking side to side for Zim. The little robot was really quite sweet when he wasn’t singing the same word for six months straight. With waving hands to get GIR’s attention Zim answered him “I’m right here GIR, it’s me. And keep it down, do you want to wake up the whole planet?” 

“I dooo,” the robot replied as Zim rolled his eyes and turned back to the ship to find a good disguise for him, concluding that a dog would be best suited for GIR, he chose a breed and faced him “Today, we become the enemy.” He spoke with determination as he positioned GIR in the right place so the ship would give him his outfit.

After it was done there was another hiss and GIR was revealed and... well GIR looked more like a cute green toy of a dog than a real dog but Zim figured that he was smart enough to make everyone believe that he had built him if anyone questioned it. 

Now fully disguised he started drawing out a home for the two of them to stay in, adding windows and other necessities, he was quite the artist if he did say so himself. 

And he did.

Zim push the mini drill into the ground and ran for cover, dragging a clueless GIR along with him. He watched as the house and the base bellow was constructed before their very eyes, cringing at the amount of noise it made.

Once it was constructed the house was mint green with a purple roof, it had a number of lawn objects such as little men with cone hats and spiky fish on sticks, not only did they look amazing but they also doubled as security for the house.

Now that the house was built a few humans had ventured outside from the nearest houses to check what was making so much noise, Zim grit his teeth and quickly ran over to them, spraying them in the face with a concoction he had been making in the ship on the way over. It was supposed to be a slight mind-altering spray but this would be the first time its been tested.

“You will all return to your dwellings and continue with your normal lives. This house has ALLLWAYS been here and I am your new neighbour, I have recently arrived here and everything is normal.” He insisted in a clear voice, tense as his tried to predict the humans next moves. Did the spray work? Did it fail? What are the side effects? How long will it last? these types of thoughts ran through Zim's head as he waited for the humans to react.

The humans blinked a few times before turning and heading back to their respective homes, with a loud sigh of relief Zim made his way towards the house “Come on Gir, lets settle in.”

He took a quick survey of the inside to ensure that the appearance was that of a human home and then he was off to the main base, underneath the house. he sat down at the computer and started talking to himself, it always helped him relax and sought out his thoughts when he spoke out loud.

“Now to find a place where I can learn more about Earth and its Humans, the more I know the sooner we can concur this puny ball of fff-filth!”

“Hmmm? What’s a Skool?”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guess who's back!   
> This one is a little short but hopefully still good :3  
> I've been thinking about doing another version of this fic from Dib's point of view, would anyone be interested in it?

After some initial research on this ‘Skool’ Zim had forged all the essential paperwork, as tedious as it was for him to fill out. He spent most of the night looking through human customs and finding the necessary information to help fill the paperwork and to make matters worse when he was applying, the Skool didn’t even ask for half of it!

Fuelled by annoyance, anxiety and lack of sleep Zim heads off to Skool. He left GIR in the house to study, whether or not the robot will heed his command, he will have to find out later. For now, he simply had to survive his first day on this filthy planet and go undetected by its strange inhabitants.

Zim finally found the classroom he would be placed in, with little to no help from the elder meat bag at the front desk. The tall, creepy looking teacher brought him into the class and began to introduce him. He wasn’t really paying any attention to what the woman was saying, choosing instead to glance around the room at the children who were mostly around his height, he glanced up as his name was called.

“-his name is Zim. Zim if you have something to say, say it now. Because after this moment, I don’t want to hear another sound from you!” The teacher hissed, glaring holes into his eyes.

Zim paused and tapped in fingers together anxiously, knowing that if he failed he would die or worse be captured and experimented on! He couldn’t let the Tallest down.

“Hello friends,” he began “I hope that we can all get along and… uhh, have a lot of fun together.” Zim said quickly, he had briefly glanced over what humans would normally say in these types of situations but now he was wishing he had spent more time rehearsing instead of constantly checking his disguise in the mirror. With a quick paranoid glance around the room, Zim realized with relief that the class didn’t really seem to care… well all but one boy in the front who was staring suspiciously at him. 

He had black hair, some of which licked back in a way that should have been physically impossible, round glasses that framed brown eyes. He wore mostly black with the exception of a blue shirt with a grey face on it.

“Take your seat now Zim.” The teacher said with a frown, Zim quickly went to the only empty seat in the front of the class at the other end from the boy who still had his eyes on him. 

The teacher began to drone on about space and its inevitable implosion but Zim really didn’t need to hear what these earthlings thought about space, he needed to know how well defended they were, so he quickly raised his hand and waited for the woman to call on him. 

“Yes Zim?” “Do you happen to know how prepared thi- we are if we were faced with, oh I don’t know… an alien invasion?” Zim asked, trying to seem calm and pretend that his little almost slip up hadn’t happened. The class was silent for a moment as the teacher stared down at him before continuing to talk about space like he hadn’t even spoken. The   
Irken felt a brief flash of anger as he glared down at his desk, ‘How dare they ignore me!’ he thought, before brushing it off with a shake of his head, they would all get what’s coming to them in the end.

The teacher had begun mumbling the word doom over and over, frankly he could go without hearing that word ever again after everything that happened with GIR. A bell rang throughout the Skool and the teacher pointed at the door with a grumble of “Go home now.” 

Zim could have sworn that Skool days were supposed to be longer but then again there was something that popped up in his research called a half day? Maybe this was it.

He followed the other children out of the classroom, trying to ignore the strange few that crawled out of windows, he would never understand humans. Pausing at the top of the steps, allowing all the other children to pass him as he thought about how he was going to find the information that he would need to overthrow this planet for the Irken empire.

Just as he began walking down the steps the sound of the door behind him opening and a voice calling his name stopped him. Zim turned and found that boy from class, the one that didn’t stop staring at him, looking down at him with a small frown on his face. He quickly supressed the urge to run and hide knowing that it would only cause more suspicion.

“Yes?” He called back after a few moments of silence and staring, the boy stepped closer before he began speaking. “That thing you said in class about preparation for an alien invasion… could it be that…” He hesitated and you could feel yourself tensing in alarm, ‘This boy had caught on! He knows that I’m an alien!’ Zim thought as panic began running through his system, one hand twitched towards his wrist ready to press the self-destruct device if needed. 

“You heard the transmission too...? That must be it!” The boy exclaimed, manic smile appearing on his face. Zim just stared blankly at him, his confusion going unnoticed as the boy continued talking to himself while he paced.

“That’s it, isn’t it?! You intercepted the same transmission from the alien invaders as I did and now you’re trying to convince everyone that they need to prepare! Right?” he asked, smile still on his face, as he spun back around to face him. 

During the humans rambling Zim had time to think, he hadn’t been caught out but this human was more dangerous than the others, he had somehow intercepted a transmission from the Tallest giving him the order to come here and had accidently mistaken Zim for an ally. “Yes, that is correct, uhh?” 

The boys smile brightened and he held out his hand “I’m Dib, I already know your name Zim.” Zim hesitantly shook the bo- Dibs hand and nodded “Well then Dib, why don’t you tell me how you found the transmission.” 

 

After spending a good few hours talking to Dib as they walked aimlessly, he found out that the human had quite an eye for the strange and paranormal unfortunately this caused others to believe he was crazy including his family. It seemed that the people of this planet didn’t believe in aliens which was lucky for Zim as it would make taking over them a lot easier. 

He had to quickly make up a story about him having similar problems with people and also finding the transmission when the Dib thing asked, the human seemed to believe he had a certain kinship with Zim which was humorous to say the least since Zim was his enemy even if the boy didn’t know it yet.

Zim finally returned to his hideout, finding GIR out of his disguise and watching some silly earth show, he sighed and removed his scratchy contacts “I’m heading to the base GIR.” “Ooooh! I’ma come too!” the robot exclaimed, following its master into one of the many hidden elevators.

A few moments later and Zim was out of his human disguise and contacting the Tallest to report in, they would be so pleased to find out how well he was doing.

“Invader Zim reporting, Sirs. The mission goes well… But surely you expected that from me.” Zim said confidently, he was after all an experienced invader, that was why the Tallest had given him this special mission in the first place. 

“Z-zim, you’re alive?” Red replied, the disbelief in his voice going right over Zim’s head “Yes, so very alive and full of goo. Mission goo. Don’t be surprised if I take care of the humans before the armada even gets here! Well I have much work to do so Invader Zim signing off.” He saluted, planning on a perfect exit before GIR fell from where he had been playing on the ceiling and landed on him, causing him to let out a yelp of “Augh my spine!” just before the transmission to the Tallest was cut off.

He grumbled and rubbed his back as he made his way back to the living room where GIR had run off to, watching yet another human show. 

“-and you can see how the predator hides in plain sight, waiting for its pray to come closer and before the pray realises it’s in danger the predator strikes.” 

Zim glanced at the TV and smirked “Hiding in plain sight, huh? Well what better way to hide myself then by pretending to be a human trying to hunt down aliens?” he laughed, causing GIR to join in with a high pitched shriek.


End file.
